Border Gavaskar Trophy: India’s top-order batters need to fire at the Gabba

Shubman Gill during a training session at The Gabba on December 13, 2024 in Brisbane, Australia.
| Photo Credit: Getty Images

Wedged between high-rises, a massive hospital, busy roads lined with flame of the forest and frangipani trees, supermarkets and old-world cafes, the Gabba seems an oasis of calm. The multiple shades of green on the turf inside remained as they were, while the pitch began to shed its tropical moist look and acquired a dry deciduous facade.

Life still lurks in this surface, and on December 14, the silence here will give way to full-throated cheer, the stomping of a speedster’s boots and the thud of a red cherry into a seasoned willow. The Border-Gavaskar Trophy series is at its tipping point. With a 1-1 backdrop, the third Test, the middle one in a long-drawn battle of five contests, should offer a fascinating insight into how India and Australia will shape up for the rest of the series.

Also read: Another sobering defeat for India in pink ball Test at Adelaide

The previous clashes at Perth and Adelaide had an air of inevitability due to India’s 295-run triumph and Australia’s riposte – a ten-wicket victory. The spice quotient, though, has been enhanced following the incident involving Mohammed Siraj and centurion Travis Head at Adelaide while rival skippers Rohit Sharma and Pat Cummins have gone easy on the rhetoric, being the antacids to quell heartburn.

Batting unit burden

India steps in with the burden of a batting unit yet to present a cohesive picture of solidity and flair, and this despite the highs at Perth, thanks to Yashasvi Jaiswal, K.L. Rahul and Virat Kohli. Lower-order chutzpah, the kind seen from the likes of Nitish Kumar, has been a belated solution and more needs to be done by his colleagues atop the batting tree.

Rohit, who ceded his opening slot to Rahul at Adelaide, is under the scanner and a big knock is overdue from him. The Mumbaikar has gone 12 innings without a hundred, a 52 against New Zealand at Bengaluru, being the lone crumb. With Josh Hazlewood cleared to play, the Australian pace attack will be more potent but, to be fair, Scott Boland was sharp in the solitary opportunity he got at Adelaide.

The visitors have to post decent runs for Jasprit Bumrah and company to twist their knives in. Test cricket’s fortunes can wax and wane and both India and Australia have felt this over the last 22 days. The bigger picture of a spot in the ICC World Test Championship final still remains, but more importantly Rohit’s men have to emulate what previous units led by Kohli and Ajinkya Rahane respectively did on the 2018-19 and 2020-21 tours.

A 2-1 verdict was the common garland that linked the two squads. The current bunch has history’s weight to deal with, but these are players who have the talent and expertise to stun the Aussies in their den. Meanwhile, Cummins and his men are on an upswing after their revival in the second Test. However, Steve Smith is yet to fire and his situation is much akin to Rohit’s drought. The redemption song of these stalwarts will be another subtext to this Test.

The teams (from):

India: Rohit Sharma (captain), Jasprit Bumrah (vice-captain), Yashasvi Jaiswal, Virat Kohli, Shubman Gill, K.L. Rahul, Devdutt Padikkal, Rishabh Pant (wicket-keeper), Dhruv Jurel (wicket-keeper), R. Ashwin, Ravindra Jadeja, Washington Sundar, Nitish Kumar Reddy, Mohammed Siraj, Harshit Rana, Abhimanyu Easwaran, Sarfaraz Khan, Akash Deep and Prasidh Krishna.

Australia: Pat Cummins (captain), Usman Khwaja, Nathan McSweeney, Steve Smith, Marnus Labuschagne, Travis Head, Mitchell Marsh, Alex Carey (wicket-keeper), Josh Inglis (wicket-keeper), Mitchell Starc, Josh Hazlewood, Scott Boland, Nathan Lyon, Beau Webster, Sean Abbott and Brendan Dogget.

Match officials: Umpires: Richard Illingworth and Richard Kettleborough; Third umpire: Chris Gaffaney; Match referee: Ranjan Madugalle.

Match starts at 5.50 a.m. IST.